SUSA represents a true step forward in helping people and communities help themselves, and achieve positive, measurable social impact.
Sharon King, President of the F.B. Heron Foundation
How will SUSA's website work?
The State of the USA (SUSA) is designing a scientifically credible, transparent and participatory process to identify a set of key issues, along with several hundred measures related to those issues and reliable sources of supporting data. SUSA’s website will also incorporate information and data from local, state and federal agencies, the private sector and nonprofit organizations. Further, SUSA will continually update and re-evaluate the issues, indicators, their related data sets and explanations; it will also update the usability of its website through extensive consultation among diverse user groups and substantive experts.
The website will be designed to serve people from many walks of life. Users will easily and quickly be able to disaggregate national information to state, regional and local levels—where the data exist. They will be able to make comparisons along a variety of dimensions, including time, race, gender, income and other demographic categories. SUSA will also reveal data gaps: areas where there are questions, but no agreed-upon methods of measurement; or areas where there are agreed-upon measures, but where data are incomplete or nonexistent.
Personalization and customization features will be available. In addition to an interactive display of information, the website will offer community features and forums for open discussion. It will also enable users to send direct feedback to SUSA by submitting questions, requesting information and offering commentary on the data.
SUSA is committed to the values of trust, understanding and quality. It is supported by a number of advisory groups and strategic partners. Its broad and growing coalition of diverse partners helps to keep it in constant touch with discussions of current events and civic issues. In particular, SUSA is developing strong partnerships with data providers at the federal statistical agencies so the website can be the best possible showcase for their valuable data sets and related information.